Cho-Oyu Expedition

Cho-Oyu Expedition from Tibet side. The British Indian Survey did not at first assign Cho Oyu a peak number. Thogh it was eventually assigned T45 (later changed MI) it must have originally seemed a minor peak among the giants that spread across the Nepalese horizon from Makalu to Dhaulagiri. The name is now invariably to mean 'Goddess of Turquise', the peak glowing turquoise when seen from Tibet in the light of an afternoon sun. As goddess is chomo in Tibetan, and turquoise is yu, the construction of chomo yu to Cho Oyu seems conclusive. A lama at Namche Bazar told Herbert Tichy that the name meant 'Mighty Head' and Heinrich Harrer claimed that the real name was Cho-I-u meaning 'god's head'. Harrer's suggestion is interesting because many early books have the peak's name as Cho Uyo, which would be a good phonetic approximation of the three Tibetan syllables. Harrer's name is also close to the alternative Tibetan translation of the name as 'bald god'. In Tibetan legend Cho Oyo, the bald god, had his back turned to Chomolungma, the mother goddess, because she refused to marry him.